7/12 Varela's findings were later replicated, in this paper by Milton and Pearce https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2016.02.065 …
-
Show this thread
-
8/12 Baumgarten et al also found evidence in the somatosensory domainhttps://www.pnas.org/content/112/39/12187 …
1 reply 1 retweet 3 likesShow this thread -
9/12 I blogged about the Baumgarten findings herehttps://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/waking-dreaming-being/201509/is-consciousness-stream-update …
1 reply 2 retweets 6 likesShow this thread -
10/12 Now, finally, for what set off this thread: I just read an excellent and comprehensive critical review of the discrete perception idea. White reviews evidence pro and con and raises difficult questions for the ideahttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S1053810018300047?via%3Dihub …
2 replies 2 retweets 6 likesShow this thread -
11/12 TLDR there's increasing evidence for periodic modulation of perceptual content based on endogenous neural rhythms. But it's not so clear this evidence supports discrete temporal perceptual frames (see White's review)
1 reply 1 retweet 4 likesShow this thread -
12/12 Coda: William James was right: consciousness flows, but it's not a uniform flow; it has inner rhythms. Whether it's also discrete (as Abhidharmikas held) is an open question
3 replies 3 retweets 22 likesShow this thread -
Replying to @evantthompson @philofbrains
1' It's anecdotal but I recall hearing years ago some sensory psychologists were testing visual discrimination in some Theravadin monks (monks who of course will have been schooled in the Abhidhammic teaching of discrete "dhammas" as building block perception-events).
1 reply 2 retweets 1 like -
2' The experimenters used a tachistoscope to flash successive lights very quickly to see if the monks could tell when it was just 1 light or 2 very close together (i.e., looking at "just noticeable differences").
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
3' They expected the monks to be good at paying attention, so they started them out flashing two lights at a speed where typically about half of regular folks see them as two flashes and half see them as a single flash. Then they asked the monks how many lights they saw.
1 reply 0 retweets 1 like -
4/4' The monks said "six." The experimenters were bemused, & asked them to describe what they had experienced, and the monks said: "I saw a light coming into being, a light remaining in being for a time, and a light going out of being. I then saw a 2d light coming into being..."
3 replies 1 retweet 3 likes
2/ Jim Austin talks about the study here in Zen and the Brain (p. 79)pic.twitter.com/IDPato9MiA
Loading seems to be taking a while.
Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.